Long winter evenings indeed! There just were not any half long enough, either in winter or summer to fit in all the things I wanted to do. During the years I was on the farm, I never once had to wonder what to do. Always it was quite the reverse - as, indeed, it still is!
But to those people who would have you believe that there is nothing to do in the country, I would say - 'just you try it fro a while!'
Nothing to do, when the whole countryside, - ponds, fields, hedges, trees, are just teeming with interest - so much so that you never could see it all in one lifetime.
There always seemed to be a good supply of squeaks which needed oiling, gates and fences needing hammer and nails, hinges needing a screw, chicken fountains to be soldered, holes to be made up in the garden fence to keep out the chickens, and so on, ad infinitum. There never was a time when you could feel that everything was in order and there was nothing that you really ought to be doing.
One Saturday afternoon I soldered a chicken fountain, thinking as I did so of the hat in the choir on Sunday which Mr. Pick described on the way home as looking like a chicken fountain, and another one as a 'crow's nest upside down.' Very apt descriptions they were too.
Having done that job, I decided to work out some kind of contraption to stop the hens from eating their own eggs. We had had a lot of bother with the hens in one house, and had tried all the usual things (including egg shells filled with mustard, which they ate with apparent relish!) and nothing had stopped them. So I thought I would try to fix up some means for putting the eggs out of reach of the hens as soon as they were laid. The hen house had a convenient hole through one corner (an old rat hole), so I took out the nest box, and put in its place another box. Through this box I made a hole which came just above the hole in the floor. I tilted the box in the direction of the hole, and made it secure with blocks of wood, and nails. So far so good, but then I was stumped for materials. Eventually I found a piece of drain-pipe and used that. The result was that the next time a hen laid in the house, immediately she got up the egg rolled gently away, popped through the hole, down the gently-sloping pipe, and out into a box in the field. This was lined with straw and covered with netting to keep off the magpies, etc. What the hens thought of it I don't know. But they continued to lay in the box, in spite of the fact that they never had anything to show for it! When Mr. Hicks saw it, he remarked 'Well, I've seen hens laying in a lot of queer places, but I've never seen one laying down a drain-pipe before!'
Mr. Pick's remark was 'Well, if that doesn't beat hen racing!' But in spite of all the sarcastic remarks, it did the job all right.
On winter evenings, there was the joy of a big log fire, and the friendly circle of oil-lamp light, followed by fire-roasted toast for supper, which always tasted better than electrically-made toast.
And always there were letters to write, endless Land Army socks to darn, (at which time the lamp lost its glamour, and I wished for a good electric bulb!) dungarees to patch, books to read, etc., etc.
I helped to run a hide Company too, and spent quite a lot of time in tracking, hunting for wild flowers, watching birds, and all the other activities.
I have some good memories of the camp fires held near the ponds at the farm, where about thirty girls tried for their fire-lighters test and afterwards used the fires to cook supper, finishing with a good sing-song by firelight.
The suppers were not perhaps up to a high standard of hygiene, but one and all agreed that nothing ever tasted so good, in spite of the fact that your egg had been cooked with someone's chips, and a few sausages, slices of bacon, sundry bits and pieces of liver, and a few slices of onions, not to mention stray pieces of grass and straw and a twig or two.
During my second year at the farm I went in for the Land Army Proficiency Test, and quite a few evenings were spent in worrying Mr. Pick with questions, and in reading farming books. This was no hardship, for 'Farmer's Library' had long been one of my favorite books.
I went for the test one morning, to a farm on the far side of York from us. I arrived back at 8 o’clock in the evening, with the nearest approach to a swelled head I had had for a long time. As I came through the gate I could see Mr. Pick and Billy, and a boy who was taking my place for the afternoon and evening, across the field behind the orchard, where they were riddling potatoes. Mrs. Pick was pleased to hear that I had passed with distinction. When Mr. Pick came in, she tried to kid him that I had failed. But he said if I had they didn't know what they were doing - a remark which increased my swelled head even more.
Periodically in my spare time, I would be smitten with an urge to 'spring clean' and would bring an array of things needing cleaning and line them up in the field - Land Army boots (two pairs), Land Army shoes, wellingtons, and (the worst job), my 'tent'. This was my W. L. A. mackintosh, which was so stiff that it would literally stand up by itself. Having duly scrubbed, cleaned and polished, it was a very nice feeling to tale them all indoors again beautifully clean. And if I had either energy or time left, my bike was always ready for a clean.
The bike-shed-cum-washhouse was also, during the summer months, the bathroom. And that in spite of a large hole in the wall directly opposite the back door! I was relieved to find that when the cold weather arrived we bathed in front of the kitchen fire. The water had, of course, to be carried to the bath in buckets from the copper in the wash-house, and afterwards the had to be lifted bodily and emptied. Later they had a fire-side boiler with a tap which cut out a lot of water-carrying, and later still they had running water and a bath-room. But these improvements came some time after my Land Army career had ended, and I went back to the farm as a 'visitor'.
During the 'Wings for Victory' week, we organized a 'mile of pennies' with the Guides. We finished up with a long snake of pennies (and Guides) around the Market Place, and a total of over twenty pounds.
One Saturday afternoon, Mrs. Pick and Christine took me to Peep O'Day Woods - a lovely name for a lovely spot. The ground was carpeted with primroses, forget-me-nots and violets, and the hedges full of blossom. And to complete it, curlews were flying over the field close by, and as I picked a bunch of the primroses I kept stopping to listen to their long, bubbling song which I think is my favorite of all bird songs.
Whenever I went around the farm, even in my spare time, I was more often than not followed by the dog. There was always a sheep-dog, although we had a few changes in the time I was there.
When I first arrived, they had an old dog names Jack. He had a very bad habit of howling in the middle of the night. Mr. Pick found out that if he told him off when he went to bed, and hit him (not hard - just as a reminder!) he didn't howl. So the last routine job to be done at night, was to 'bray the dog'.
Jack got too old to be any use on the farm, and when I had been there about ten months, in mid-January, they got a new dog - Rover. He was a lovely dog, and a great favorite of mine. If I was harrowing, or doing any similar job with the horses, Rover would stay at my heels the whole day, just trotting up and down the field with me, his tail wagging most of the time, and especially if I spoke to him. He was never more than two or three yards away. He learnt quickly, too, and would have made a splendid farm dog. But unfortunately he was run over by an Army lorry which was going at full speed down the lane. Mr. Pick and I saw it happen. I ran to him and knelt down and stroked him. He lifted his head, licked the back of my hand, and died.
For about six months we were without a dog. But a dog is really a necessity on a farm.
One morning, very early, some stones rattled against my bedroom window. I jumped out of bed, and there was George, standing on a wooden box, and handing up a sheep-dog puppy. Leaning out as far as I could, I just managed to reach it and haul it in. He was a present for Christine for her sixth birthday, and his name was Roy.
After his rather unusual entry into the household, he quickly settled down, and was still full of beans when I left the farm.